


les animaux

by miominmio



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Animals, Falling In Love, Fluff, Fluffy Ending, Love, M/M, NY - Freeform, Rain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-18
Updated: 2016-12-18
Packaged: 2018-09-09 13:26:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8892448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miominmio/pseuds/miominmio
Summary: Credence meets a cute pet shop keeper and discovers that there are good people, after all. Beginning of slash Credence/Newt.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [theStarfly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theStarfly/gifts).



Credence hesitated outside of the pet shop, not quite wanting to enter, not quite wanting to stay outside. He was cold unto the bone, wet clothes dragging and black hair plastered against skin, and the warm light of the interior did seem awfully inviting.

Instead, he lit a fag, cupping his hand over the lighter, breathed in deeply, and coughed a little. A jogger with expensive trainers gave him a dirty look as she ran by, and he retreated further into the shadows of the space between the pet shop and an Asian eatery, shoulders hunched.

He was finishing his second cigarette when a door to the side of the shop opened and a young man with bin bags in his hands came out. He did not see Credence at first, busy as he was with his task, lean muscles tense in his arms over which he had rolled up his shirtsleeves. The rain created a pattern of darker colours over his shirt and apron as he recycled some cans and glass jars. Finished, he turned back, then suddenly stopped and looked up.

Credence found himself pinned by a leaf-green stare, and it was not scornful, or angry, but curious and concerned. He had to look away quickly, pale skin furiously flushing, not to speak of what his heart was doing.

“Are you alright?”

Credence was not sure – how could he be sure when he had never been outside of New York and had seen little to no television in his life? – but the man’s accent sounded British, and while he was already punishing himself for thinking such a sinful thought, he thought it was distinctly sexy.

He remembered with a jolt that the stranger had asked a question and made a small noise of agreement, shrugging his shoulders as was his custom.

When he dared to look up again, the Englishman looked unconvinced. Yet there was no anger marring his defined features, and a smile played on his lips.

“You look like you might need a cup of tea. You can come in if you like?” He nodded at the wall of the shop.

Again, Credence hesitated. He looked over his shoulder at the street beyond, its colours washed away by rain. He saw himself lost in the grey, anonymous but inconspicuous. He also saw himself inside the kind man’s pet shop, among the animals with a steaming cup in his hands. Warm. Safe.  
With a small nod, he let the man lead him in through the back door, keeping a careful distance between them. This was all new and unexpected, and his nicotine-stained fingers itched for another smoke if only to channel the electric nervousness within him.

It was a relief to get out of the storm, the inside of the shop welcomingly warm and dry. A thousand smells of food, litter and animals assaulted his nostrils, but once the first shock had passed he found it quite comforting. Looking around, he saw that he was standing among shelves on which lay the oddest of things relating to animals: one shelf contained the aquarium of an axolotl, another simply bottles of milk for kittens.

With a sound slam the man shut the door behind them, making Credence jump in surprise. His new acquaintance slipped past without their bodies touching, and knelt on the floor to scoop up a duckling which had waddled into the storage area, putting it back into a nest of old t-shirts containing more ducklings off to one corner.

Straightening, the man beamed at Credence. “Welcome to my shop!” He suddenly smiled sheepishly, rubbing his forehead: “I apologise, where are my manners? My name is Newt, Newt Scamander.”

He held a hand out to Credence.  
Credence looked at it, looked at the freckles of Newt’s skin, saw the callouses on the pads of his fingers. The idea of touching Newt’s hand made him want to smoke a whole pack of cigarettes at once. But somehow he found the bravery to close the distance between them and press his own, much softer hand into Newt’s anyway.

“Credence,” he mumbled, both relieved and disappointed when their hold fell apart,” I’m Credence.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Credence,” Newt said gently, and incredulous as it would seem, Credence believed that he was being genuine.

"Do you want to see the animals?"

Credence shrugged and gave a small nod of his head at the same time, contradicting gestures which normally would confuse a person, but Newt seemed to understand. He led the way between the shelves, through a doorway and into the front of the shop, bustling with all kinds of creatures from turtle doves to kittens to fire salamanders. A Norwegian forest cat was lounging on the window sill above a heater and nestling in her fur slept a snow vole. One could imagine that such a menagerie would be chaotic, natural predators and prey sharing the same space, but somehow it worked, seemed harmonic even.

Credence got distracted just by looking at the different types of fish in a tank by the door. The gourami he saw in there exuded a sort of tranquillity human life often lacked, and which he longed for.

"Can I take your coat?"

Credence started, and, aware that Newt had seen him jump, immediately felt embarrassed. The oversized leather jacket he had found in a thrift shop was soaked through and increasingly uncomfortable. Yet the idea of taking it off gave him pause: he was only wearing a t-shirt underneath. Newt would see his bare arms, his _scars._

Something in Credence's frowning expression must have hinted at his dilemma, because Newt helpfully supplied: "It doesn't matter - forgive me. Just thought you might want to get warm."

With a deep breath, Credence slipped out of the jacket, hairs on his arms rising as they were suddenly bared. Fortunately, most of the scarring was on the inside of his arms, starting in the crook of his elbows and lacing over the skin to fade at his wrists, and if he kept his arms at his sides, was not overtly visible.

If Newt saw something, he made no fuss about it, simply took Credence's jacket and draped it over the heater, earning himself a dirty look from the Norwegian cat.

Credence's shivered though the air was warm, feeling at a loss of what do to with himself.

Newt ducked behind the counter and turned on a kettle. As the water steadily came to a boil, he gestured at a couple of armchairs next to a canary cage, mismatched and patched with different fabrics, but looking very comfortable and plush. "Make yourself at home, please."

Credence made a noncommittal noise and sauntered over to the chairs. He felt guilty about the hospitality he was being shown, but it was nonetheless nice to sit down, and the warmth enveloping him like a duvet even more so.

He felt tempted to ask Newt about the reason for his kindness, but he was so afraid that it would stop that he became tongue-tied each time he was about to bring it up.

Newt came over with a tray laden with two steaming cups, milk and sugar. Credence was so nervous that he drank too large a gulp of tea at once and so burned his tongue. While waiting for the beverage to cool, he watched Newt spoon sugar into his own tea, more sugar than Credence probably consumed in a month. Once the shopkeeper had adequately sweetened the tea, he nonchalantly popped the teaspoon into his mouth, winked at Credence, and poured milk into the mix.

Credence's pulse jumped. Despite his best tries, he could not keep his eyes off Newt's lips. When the man looked up, he quickly averted his eyes, staring at the patterns of the carpet under their feet instead.

"Do you have a pet, Credence?" Newt asked once he had removed the spoon from his mouth, and was sipping his drink. His green eyes peered inquisitively at Credence over the rim of the mug.

Credence shook his head hastily, his thoughts miles away from pets. He glanced briefly at his surroundings: the colourful canaries, the menacing boas and lazy cats. He had never had an animal of his own, more than the few bugs he had played with when he was little.

"Do you like animals, then?"

"... yeah."

He did. Once a couple of months ago he had visited a dog shelter, and looking into the round, brown eyes of abandoned pups and older dogs, had found a bit of himself in them.

A peat-coloured Dachshund ran over to Newt from the shadows of the storage area, wagging its tail with an energy that would have kept the shop going for a year, and yapped at Newt’s feet excitedly. Newt picked the oblong dog up and scratched its back: its eyes narrowed in pleasure.

“This is Dorothy,” Newt said of the dog, looking at her with the same reverence Credence had seen fathers look at their daughters. He felt a pang of jealousy, then immediately reprimanded himself for this folly: it was only a dog after all.

“Do you want to hold her?”

Credence nodded and embraced Dorothy as Newt handed her over. Newt’s hand touched Credence’s bare arm briefly and Credence held his breath, small hairs all over his body rising. Even as he was cuddling the Dachshund – and she took to him quickly, relishing the scratches he gave her and finally curling up in his lap and falling asleep – he was replaying the moment Newt had touched him, heat pulsing in his chest.

He was half-sure that he was broadcasting his feelings openly ( _she_ used to say that he was a terrible liar, that his heart was always on his sleeve), but Newt either made no notice of it or gave the pretence of making no notice of it. Credence realized he had never quite met anyone like him before, his sympathy and patience continually of a surprise to him.

The best course of action, though, would be to not get too attached: the more he liked Newt, the worse his heartbreak would be when, inevitably, Newt got tired of him. The best course of action would be to play it safe, to protect his heart.

Yet he was also tired of playing it safe, of not allowing himself to take a chance just because the stakes were too high. There was a nagging thought in the back of his head that told him that the rewards of risking everything could be great, too.

For the while being, though, they sat together in that kind of comfortable silence usually only long-time friends share, their tea mugs empty and animals making their noises around them.  

Credence was so comfortable that he could fall asleep himself, the warmth and the company lulling him to slumber. Only the thought of Newt kept him awake.  

Careful not to rouse Dorothy, he fished his phone out of his pocket to check the time on the cracked screen. He realized that over an hour had passed since Newt had welcomed him inside, and in that time their peace had not been disturbed by a single customer.

“Do you get many people, you know, coming in?” he asked in a quiet voice, his shyness preventing him from keeping eye-contact between himself and Newt.

Looking unbothered, Newt shook his head. “Not really. To be honest, I don’t really advertise my services, so it’s not a surprise.” He leaned forward suddenly, minimizing the distance between them, tapped his nose with a finger and winked at Credence. “Between you and me, I don’t want to sell a single one of my animals. I mean, you wouldn’t sell members of your family.”

The latter part of that sentence made Credence deeply uncomfortable, but he nodded all the same.

Newt leaned back and combed through his hair with his fingers. Whereas the colour of anyone’s else’s hair would have been dulled by the grey light streaming in from the outside, the copper tones of Newt’s were only amplified by it. Credence could not quite quell the impulse to run his own hands through Newt’s hair, finding out whether it was soft or coarse, silky or downy.

Newt chewed his lip as he considered Credence, who was now completely failing at keeping his thoughts in check. “You know, if you’re interested – I do need an assistant in this shop.”

Credence’s heart took flight. “What?”

“A job here, with me, if you want it.”

It felt too good to be true. It _was_ too good to be true. Credence almost wanted _her_ to jump out from behind one of the shelves, jap her finger sharply into his chest and hiss promises of punishment into his ear, because that would be less painful than the alternative, that this was a joke, a _prank_. Maybe Credence was reading Newt wrong, having mistaken his spite for kindness. He _wanted_ Newt to be the good man who he seemed to be, but it did not mean it was the truth.

“But… I mean, are you sure? I’m just a stranger,” he stammered in a small voice, his body tensing in anticipation of the blow of disappointment, a lump forming in his throat.

 _Please,_ he thought.

Newt smiled, and his smile was of such a comfort that Credence relaxed ever so slightly. “You know, sometimes you could have known someone for years and discover that you never truly knew them at all. Sometimes you know someone for an hour and yet they are as familiar to you as someone you’ve known your whole life.” His smile changed, becoming more playful, and Credence understood what he was implying. “You can think about my offer for however long you may like, of course. And if you don’t want to work here, you are welcome anytime anyway.”

The lump in Credence’s throat remained, but now not because of sadness. Relief washed over him like the warmth had when he had first been invited inside the shop by Newt.

“Yes!” he exclaimed, louder than he had intended to,” I mean, if you will have me… I – I don’t mind.”

Newt beamed at him and Credence felt feather-light.

“Brilliant!”

Maybe Credence would not be completely in the wrong to assume that Newt liked him back. Maybe there was hope for him after all.

“Now, the more important question,” said Newt and Credence made a mental note to sketch his features when he got back home,” would you like another cup of tea?”

 


End file.
